Ask HN: Self hosted user friendly chat app for family?

I am looking for a self hosted chat solution I can use with my family. As I will self host it, I do not care about end to end encryption (SSL is fine).

I am currently running conduit with the matrix.org protocol.

Protocol is very complicated (and things like sending messages from a web hook for example is complex). Also, I tried to join federated rooms, but my client (element) just crash. So I don't really care about keeping my server.

I want to change mostly because I don't get mobile push notifications (and some features I want below are missing).

I tried different matrix clients but none are really nice and tick all the boxes, so I don't feel like keeping my server.

I don't care about the protocol, I know XMPP and IRC which are both "OK", but something proprietary but open source would be fine.

On the client side, I have a hard time to find the following features:

required:

- android and linux client

- mobile notifications (on android)

- read receipt

- inline images

- message edit

- message deletion

nice to have:

- easy gif sending (like being able to post a tenor or similar gif)

- stickers

- link preview

I wonder if the collective HN brain has any idea.

Cheers

8 points | by kuon 510 days ago

3 comments

  • kgodey 510 days ago
    I maintain a Synapse homeserver for our open source project and it seems to work fine, I don't know how different it is from Conduit.

    Other open source and self-hosted chat apps I've heard of but haven't used are Mattermost[1] and Rocket.chat[2].

    [1] https://mattermost.com/

    [2] https://www.rocket.chat/

    [-]
    • kuon 510 days ago
      Last time I tried synapse, it was very very resource hungry. I can give it another try, but I found no matrix client with the features I'd like.
    • kuon 510 days ago
      I installed a mattermost instance, and while a little bit overkill, it has all the features I need.
      [-]
      • kgodey 509 days ago
        I'm glad it works for you! It does seem like it's targeted towards enterprise customers so it makes sense that it's a bit overkill for your needs.
  • guilhas 505 days ago
    I would use Jami, it is not self hosted, but it is p2p, and does not require phone number or email
  • jqpabc123 510 days ago
    I have been tempted to produce something similar as a progressive web app that will work in any browser. Thus far, I haven't found the time to do it.